WATERFRONT LABOUR.

Auckland Star, Volume LVII, Issue 132, 5 June 1926, Page 10

WATERFRONT LABOUR.

A SHORTAGE YESTERDAY.

CONDITIONS NOW NORMAL.

When cargo work was resumed on the Auckland waterfront yesterday morning there was a considerable shortage of labour, the result being that during the day a number of steamers in port worked short handed. Referring to the matter this morning, the president of the Auckland Waterside Workers Union (Mr. 0. Mcßrine) said that work was offering for between sixty and eighty more men than were available. In addition to all the members of the union present, a number of non-union members had to be engaged. The cause of the shortage, said Mr. Mcßrine, had ; heen due to two reasons, the first being ' that the holiday on the King's birthday had resulted in an unusual number of vessels being in port, and the second that the threatening conditions of the weather ' after daybreak yesterday had caused a number of the union members, who lived onsiderable distances away from the city, to believe that there would be no work done. The conditions to-day, added Mr. Mcßrine, were again normal. Included in the vessels affected by the shortage of labour yesterday were the Commonwealth and Dominion steamers Port Hardy and Port Curtis, and the Union Company's steamers Kaimanawa and Kairanga. The New Zealand Shipping Company was elso affected.